Automobile Market Remains Slow in Shopping Season

Launching many attractive programmes and new product lines, automobile firms have laid their hopes on somehow improving sales in the busiest shopping season at the end of the year. However, the results so far haven’t met expectations.

 

Concerning luxury lines, Euro Auto, BMW distributor in Vietnam, has announced its stimulus programme for the multipurpose X series, with models X1, X3, X5, X6, in the last 10 days of November. Accordingly, the customers will be given 2-years insurance on the vehicle body, an interior care tool set and package service and authentic painting service.

 

As for the small car line, Toyota Motor Vietnam (TMV) has launched a promotion for its Yaris E, valued at VND 40 million, from now till the end of March 2013. The package includes full insurance of Liberty, accessory set of “rearview camera and LCD Screen compatible with Rearview Mirror”, voucher for authentic Toyota accessories and a preferential interest rate of 6 percent/year in first 6 months for loans from Toyota Financial Service Vietnam.

 

In October, TMV was the manufacturer with the highest turnover, at 2,497 vehicles sold, occupying 33.6 percent of the market of Vietnam Automobile Manufacturer Association (VAMA), up by 10 percent against September 2012. However, this number was 17 percent lower than in last October. Many TMV agents said that the thriving turnover in October 2012 against the previous months was partially thanks to purchases and disbursement in last months of some agencies and enterprises who all chose Japanese vehicles given their advantages of reasonable price, cheaper repair or maintenance costs.

 

Although there are no available figures on both manufacturing stage and finished vehicle imports, Huyndai Thanh Cong has always considered the tourism vehicle market a reliable sector. At present, the accumulative sale of tourism vehicles with less than 9 seats is just lower than that of TMV. Thus, Huyndai Thanh Cong’s release of 2 new models of Huyndai Santa Fe 2013 and i30 2013 last week, in the context that some firms are focusing on price promotions, has made the competition more appealing.

 

VAMA announced that, despite the arrival of the busiest shopping season of the year, the automobile market still remains grey.

 

In October 2012, there was total 7,998 vehicles sold in the market (including 6,782 domestically assembled ones and 1,216 imported finished ones), down by 21 percent year by year. Among those, VAMA, the key and dominant force in Vietnam Automobile market, accounted for 7,430 ones, down by 21 percent year by year and up slightly, by 6 percent, against September 2012.

 

The low sales figures have no cause, other than a variety of policies by management agencies in the direction of either gathering all or tightening automobile use, which has discouraged consumers wishing to own a car.